


The children are our future

by writeitinthestars



Category: Falling Skies
Genre: F/M, an au where lourdes was never part of the second mass, and she kept her faith while at the same time being more sassy than anything, and then suddenly tHE ALIENS ATTACKED, like she went to college in boston but she went home to mexico city for christmas with her family
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-07-28
Updated: 2015-11-11
Packaged: 2018-04-11 18:43:10
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,870
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4447466
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/writeitinthestars/pseuds/writeitinthestars
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Lourdes Delgado and the other survivors from Mexico City are curious as to why they're being called a 'Mason militia' by the even more mysterious Volm. The Volm decide to oblige their curiosity. The 2nd Mass never expected to meet survivors from another country, let alone this many.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Lost in Translation

“I just don’t understand why the Volm would bring new people when we’re already short on supplies and food,” the older man in the trenchcoat said.

Lourdes Delgado felt her father stiffen up next to her before he responded in a quiet voice. The men standing in front of them looked lost, since he’d chosen to answer in Spanish rather than English. There were some words that Lourdes didn’t want to say.

“What did he just say?” Lourdes’s attention turned to the tall, dark haired young man standing next to the older man.

“He said ‘And we don’t understand why we’re being called a Mason militia when we have no idea who any of the Masons are,’” the short girl held her head up high as she finished translating and she thought she saw the corner of the younger man’s mouth twitched up into a small smile as the older man almost scowled at them. “He also said that you’re not the only people short on supplies. Half of our people died in the ghetto before the Volm even showed up as reinforcements.”

“How many people do you have now,” the dark haired young man spoke up before the man that Lourdes assumed was his father even had a chance to say anything.

“About 50. Give or take a few,” Lourdes shrugged her shoulders.

“45 at my last count,” her brother spoke up from the doorway where he’d been standing guard and listening. He was good at that and Lourdes knew that he was probably trying to think up a winning argument for if the Mason family wanted to send them packing. Francisco was good at that. He’d been a lawyer before the invasion happened. Even though he was only 30, Lourdes had spotted grey flecks in his dark hair and beard recently. She suspected it was from the stress of everything, especially after she’d spotted a single nearly grey hair of her own one day while pulling her hair back. She never mentioned it.

“So what? Now we’re going to need food for 90 people?” Lourdes could tell that the eldest Mason was slowly working his way up her brother’s list of ‘least favorite people to meet in the upcoming apocalypse’ and she couldn’t disagree with him on that.

“Tom...we need the extra fighters. You were saying so yourself yesterday. Right, Hal? The amount of people we have left to fight is, what? 25? 30?” The dark haired woman on the other side of the table from Lourdes finally spoke up. She was a doctor. Lourdes had seen her patch up the cut on her father’s face when they’d first arrived.

“Not only can we fight but we can help out in other ways. My brother’s a lawyer so he’s a good bargainer. Marcus is a cook. If we get supplies, he’d be able to cook for all of us. He’s made food for more people than this with less supplies than we thought necessary. And I’m a doctor.”

“You’re a doctor,” the young man, who she now knew was called Hal, raised an eyebrow at her.

“I was training to be a doctor, anyway. I was in my third semester of pre-med when the invasion hit. I went to school in Boston.” Lourdes cut him off before he could say anything else.

Negotiations were made and no one was sure how long they were in the makeshift bunker, but they finally agreed on terms. They were allowed to stay and so the 2nd mass grew by almost half.

Lourdes was the shortest out of all of the Delgados as they walked towards the outskirts of the camp known as ‘Chinatown’ to their new allies. Her brother was a few inches taller than her, closer to 5’10. Her father was almost as tall as him. Lourdes had gotten her height from her mother. She’d been a short, pretty woman. But she’d died months ago in the ghetto and there was so much chaos that they’d barely had time to think about anything other than getting rid of the aliens that had sought out to destroy them.

“Hey!” The three of them all turned in unison, raising their guns a little bit at the sound of the person approaching them. It was Hal and the three of them lowered their guns.  
“Can I do something for you,” Lourdes raised an eyebrow slightly. Why had he chased them down like that?

“I thought you looked hungry.” He reached into his coat pocket and pulled out a few slices of bread. Probably not the freshest in the world, but it was enough to make their stomachs growl. “It’s not much. But like my dad said, we’re running low on supplies. We’re sending out scouts later on to try and find more food, I think.”

Stale bread had never looked or tasted so good.


	2. The Wall

Lourdes had been recruited to help build a wall and it took a good amount of inner strength to not mention to anyone if they’d even seen Les Miserables and if they knew how badly a barricade worked out sometimes. Working alongside some of the people was alright. But she was quick to find out that some members of the 2nd Mass was more pleasant than others.

John Pope was, unfortunately, not a person who belonged to the former group of pleasant people. Working next to an older blonde woman, Lourdes had caught wind of the man talking.

“Mexicans coming in and stealing our food,” was the first thing she heard and she resisted the urge to whirl around and ask him what his problem was. It wasn’t like it was their choice to have the Volm haul them hundreds of miles to the middle of a decimated city in South Carolina.

"He's not worth it," the blonde girl standing next to her spoke up suddenly, gaining Lourdes's attention. Despite what she said, though, Lourdes noticed the girl tense up. The guy wasn’t only getting to the newly migrated survivors, but to his own  group as well.

A few feet down the wall, Lourdes noticed her brother straighten up. The tension that had just settled on the crowd was obvious, as many people had stopped pretending to ignore the ranting man. It probably wasn’t the wisest decision for the man to continue, A few of the survivors from Mexico City happened to be criminals. Small time compared to worser crime rings like the cartel, but still. They weren’t the most passive people in the world and Lourdes wondered how much more they would be able to take if her normally level-headed older brother was ready to throw a few punches.

“You need to watch your mouth,” Francisco spoke up and ground his teeth together as he took a step in the direction of the older man. He just looked smugger than ever, though, and a few members of the 2nd Mass rolled their eyes. They were used to it and knew by now that there was probably no stopping a racist tirade.

“John,” an older blonde woman stepped up next to the long haired man, putting a hand on his arm. The tension in the air didn’t disipate as the man allowed himself to be led away by the woman who Lourdes could only guess was his girlfriend.

“He’s an asshole,” the blonde next to Lourdes broke the silence after what seemed like hours. It was no more than a few seconds, though.

“Yeah no kidding…” Lourdes shook her head. She’d been raised a Catholic and both her parents had instilled in her the fact that people were inherently good. It became painfully obvious once the aliens invaded that it wasn’t as true as everyone wanted to believe. “He’s just narrow-minded. Nothing’s going to change that.”

Francisco stared at his younger sister for a second before sighing and walking back over towards the area of the wall he was working on with a man named Anthony. Being a lawyer had changed his opinion on the fact that people were good. He’d met too many bad people. People like John Pope and people far worse than him to continue believing that every single person was good.

The blonde stared after Francisco for a second before turning back to Lourdes and offering her a hand, though she seemed a little reluctant to. “Maggie.”  
“Lourdes,” the dark haired girl smiled as she shook the older girl’s hand. Maggie was a pretty young woman that seemed to be more on guard, yet somehow more open minded,  than some of the others around her. Lourdes was about to ask her another question when the woman turned around and she spotted it. There at the base of her neck was a little metallic spike. She’d seen them once before.

“Is that from one of the harnesses? Were you harnessed?” Meeting a harnessed kid, yet alone one who’d survived the de-harnessing process, was rare now. She knew that it was able to be done. The Volm that had accompanied them, who was called Shaq by members of the 2nd Mass she’d seen, had told them about a machine that allowed them to remove the spikes from the backs of kids. Of course, it was too late for Lourdes’s cousin who’d been harnessed too early on.

“I wasn’t harnessed...but yeah. They’re spikes.” Spikes. So that was what they called them here. Much like the term ‘Skitter’, it would be something for all of them to get used to.

“Then how do you-”

“Maggie!” Both women turned to see who’d called out. It came to almost no surprise that it was Hal Mason. He seemed to be everywhere, keeping tabs on everyone and seeking people out.

“Hal, what’s wrong?” Maggie straightened up, hands going to the holsters that held her guns at her sides. It was instinctual by now. Even if there wasn’t any direct danger, it was better to be prepared than to be caught off guard for one single second. One second could mean life or death. That’s how it’d been with Jimmy...Deni...and now Maggie knew better than ever that staying on your guard meant surviving.

“We think we found food.”


	3. Sharing

Meeting again with Tom Mason so soon was not anything that any of the Delgados had been looking forward to. Yet there they were just a few days later, starving and in the same dimly lit dungeon of a meeting room. 

“There's a canned food factory a county over,” an older man named Weaver announced to the small group in front of him.

The Delgado siblings couldn't stop their eyebrows from raising and, despite the many skeptical looks throughout the room, no one questioned him. Everyone was as hungry as everyone else so even the promise of food was enough to get them to stop arguing for just a few minutes.

After a few moments of bickering about whether or not to use a storm drain close by for cover to travel that far, Lourdes moved over slightly to make room for Hal at the table. “What other choice do we have,” he said as he leaned almost over her shoulder to point at the map. “The Colonel says the storm drain is the best route to the food distribution center and it comes out right by there.”

“Considering it hasn't already been cleaned out,” Pope interjected and Francisco clenched his fist. The urge to punch the older man in the mouth returned with a vengeance.

“What other choice do we have?” Francisco gritted his teeth and, despite a warning look from his father, did not back down.

“I'll do it.” An older blonde woman, Sara, spoke up after a few seconds. This seemed to break the tension and settle things. People were going to get food and there was no use fighting it.

“I'll go as well,” Francisco spoke up again and all the attention in the room turned to him.

“Why the hell should we let this guy go,” Pope spoke up and Lourdes rolled her eyes.

“Because. If you have four of your people going, we deserve at least one. We should know that our people are going to get food as well.”

~

The promise of food was lingering over everyone's heads as Francisco made his way out past the barricade with Hal's brother, Ben, Maggie, Sara, and Pope. A collective sigh of relief had been heard across the wall as they realized that the scavengers had made it safely past the obstacles in the way of them reaching the underground tunnels.

Lourdes had overheard someone, in a fit of desperation, cutting open the leg of a skitter and eating the meat. Just the thought of it made her squirm in disgust. The only thing that was worse was the fact that she'd had to see the man's dead body when they'd brought him to the infirmary. It reminded her of how desperate people could be in times of need. She'd only thought of that, though, after she finished spilling out the minimal contents of her stomach just outside the door of the infirmary. Someone's jaw melted away was not something you could ever be expected to take lightly. Looking over the body hadn't taken that much time; there wasn't that much left to begin with.

Lourdes was reading in the corner of the infirmary, taking a small break by order of Anne Glass. She couldn't tell the family dynamic between Anne and the Masons just yet, but if Anne walking away from Tom looking ready to light a fire under someone's ass meant anything then it left a lot to be desired for all parties. She wasn't going to be the one to judge them, though. In desperate times, lonely people tended to find each other. Lourdes had seem it first hand in Mexico City; a series of rushed marriages and different relationships as soon as the inevitable end of the world began. She hadn't been so lucky yet and part of her doubted that she wanted to be.

“Hungry?” A voice snapped her from her thoughts and she looked up from her book. To her surprise, the eldest Mason son was standing in front of her with a bowl. Peering into it, she saw there was what would at best be a few spoonfuls of rice left at the bottom.

“You've been giving your rations to your brother,” she took the bowl from him and set it on the cot next to her. Not missing the look he gave her, she shook her head. “I saw you. Don't worry, I won't tell anyone.”

“Thanks,” he mumbled in return as he cast a glance around the room, taking in the sight of people nearing the end because of exhaustion or malnutrition or just plain battle wounds.

“You can sit down if you want,” Lourdes piped up again as she scooted to the side more to make room for the young man who sat down next to her. The exhaustion on his face was much more obvious from this position. Part of her, the part that was still in medic mode, wanted to scold him for not sleeping but it was hardly her place if he was needed on the front lines. Plus, any excuse to avoid a confrontation with Tom Mason was a good one. “You look tired, Hal.”

Hal rolled his eyes as a yawn escaped him before he even had the chance to deny it. He was exhausted from long hours patrolling the wall with his fellow fighters. Sure, they worked in shifts; but even after someone showed up to relieve him of his post, sleep avoided him. Too much adrenaline pumping through his veins, it was something his mother had said a long time ago. The only difference was that back then, she was talking about the adrenaline from a lacrosse game. Not from fighting off a hostile alien invasion. He doubted it was even the patrols making him tired, but just the war in general. Four years of fighting had been hard on him. Still, he managed a weak smile as he caught the girl sitting next to him grab a few grains of rice from the bowl between her fingers. “You're not looking so hot either, Delgado,” he drew out the last syllable and couldn't hold back a laugh at the girl's face.

Lourdes wrinkled her nose and slapped the taller one lightly on the side of his head with her book, “Charming. Is that how you managed so many girlfriends during the end of the world?” She'd heard enough from Maggie to know that Hal had been able to find more significant others than most during the apocalypse.

“Wouldn't you like to know,” was the mumbled response that Lourdes got.

“Don't think so highly of yourself, Mason.” Lourdes rose from her spot on the cot, “I have patients to check on and I think you have a job to do. Come find me if you're actually in need of medical attention.” With that, the dark haired young woman flicked her hair over her shoulder and walked off, leaving Hal Mason to stare after her with a childlike grin on his face.

 


End file.
